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Sunday, February 1, 2009

Waiting to be Fired



Waiting to be Fired

I am a retired person who wonders what life for me would be like were I gainfully employed. How would I feel if my work was in an industry that was susceptible to recessionary or depressionary forces? Being retired doesn’t make me exempt. If anything it’s probably a worse situation because I am at an age which is beyond me being hired even if there was work.

I imagine that were I an employee of any one of the industries at risk, and that includes most, I would find it very difficult to concentrate on my work. Most people give in to temptation and mortgage their future paycheques because that is how we live. The stress levels among employees must be sky high, and that does nothing to improve job performance.

I was seriously affected by the very recent news story of a couple in America who both worked at an hospital, and were both laid off. They had a family of five children, and I suppose they had completely run out of money and hope. The man first shot his wife as she slept, then systemically went to each child and shot him or her dead, and then turned the gun on himself.

That’s not the first time in recent memory that has happened, and unfortunately I think it will happen in the future many times. In America, where guns are so easily obtainable, and in these impossible times it really is a very easy way out. A final solution! As I write this I am getting goose bumps, but I really do think that it will be part of the cost of the disaster that the American economy is going through.

I am a professional accountant, and in that capacity I worked as a manager of proprietry insurance companies. My clients were Fortune 500 companies and the work we did for them was vital in controlling their losses, so I think perhaps I may have been secure for some time to come. Some businesses are recessionary proof, such as undertakers, doctors and other branches of the medical world, and insurance, among others.

What happens in times like these, which are unprecedented? Firstly, it seems that every company of substance are announcing layoffs by the thousands. In America, during the last three or four months of 2008 layoffs totalling more than 2.6 million were announced. That means major companies, so we have to guesstimate a number in addition to those for small companies that have gone out of business. And it continues in the present! These are not just numbers. They are the loss of dreams, ambitions, hope, and of course, private education, homes, cars, etc.

If you are enrolled in a social insurance programme that pays loss of job benefits for a period that will give you a cushion while you frantically search for something else. However, when all around you are downsizing the sense of depression and outright fear must be overwhelming.

There are some people who actually try to live within their means. By that I mean that if they don’t have the cash for it, they don’t buy it. Businesses think that this is a ridiculous way to conduct one’s affairs. We get credit cards filling our mailboxes, and all sorts of tempting offers to go into debt. Business needs for us to spend today and not worry about the long-term, because in the long-term we are all dead. It’s that type of thinking that has got the world in so much ca-ca.

The banks are saying that they cannot loan any more money. Well, that’s the way we have been doing business and without credit we all go back to basics. Can we do that? Haven’t we come too far to go back? The talk is about re-building, but on what basis. We surely can’t re-build on the same sandy patch as we did before. Our house will simply fall down again. So, what’s the answer?

The cold hard situation is that no-one knows anything, and that’s enough to chill me to the bone. So, those who opt to take the, admittedly cold hard way out just won’t be around to see how it all turns out. Personally, I’d like to live to be one hundred, or at least long enough to see whether President Barack Obama can make any difference at all. I know that he is determined to do so, but remember, no-one knows anything!


Copyright © 2009 Eugene Carmichael